


ARC-950701

by n_kei



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Robots & Androids, Anarchy, M/M, Philosophy, Science Fiction, Slice of Life, Slow Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-17
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-09-05 19:38:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20278711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/n_kei/pseuds/n_kei
Summary: Jung Jaehyun, a fourth year student at the National Police Academy, already has his work cut out for him. Adding to the madness, he stumbles upon a discarded ARC by the dumpster which subsequently throws his life into a tizzy.





	1. 01

**Author's Note:**

> This is the revised story with the same title (because I am unoriginal like that).
> 
> Guys! The wait is over, the revision is up! Thank you for your patience. Thank you for your understanding. I hope you like the new and improved version :) Much love ♡

Jaehyun inhales deeply, looking out the window and into the sprawling town before him.

The sensitive leaves of the Japanese maple are rimmed with a ruby red, signifying the change of a new season. Beneath it are clusters of white balloon flowers, sunny goldenrods, pink and peach chrysanthemums, and foxtail ferns. The loud visual combination likens the last thirty two bars of Vivaldi’s Summer of Four Seasons– chaotic, and full of life. Crawling across the walls of the cafe are honeysuckles that add a clean, light, and steady fragrance of white and gold to the air.

Jaehyun exhales, and closes the window.

Summer has come and passed all too quickly, and the autumn school term has begun again.

“Hey, think Kibum will be back soon?” Asks a voice behind him.

“Probably not for another half an hour.” Jaehyun checks the time on his wrist, a simple thin black band projecting holographic digits above. “Why do you ask?”

His coworker smiles sheepishly, the corners of his almond eyes crinkling in a charming way. “I’m a bit behind on an assignment.” Jaehyun observes him for a moment, taking the strong nose, full lips, and auburn hair pulled into a short ponytail in the back. He snorts and waves for him to go ahead.

Johnny smiles gratefully, shuffling to the back room to get his backpack. After a bit of jostling, he pulls out a doll and places him on the table. Jaehyun tries not to stare.

The doll is no more than 8 inches tall, a mini Articulated Robot Controller (or ARC for short). As the name suggests, it’s a robot designed to execute orders flawlessly, a computer for the future. The “controller” is, by process of elimination, the owner of the ARC.

Johnny affectionately calls his mini-ARC “Taeil”, it's a gift from his parents. Johnny’s family is by no means rich, but when Johnny announces that he’ll be moving back to their hometown of Seoul for schooling, his parents had given him Taeil so the mini-ARC can keep an eye on him.

Mini-ARCs like Taeil are becoming more common, much like the cell phones of the early-to-mid 21st century.

At some point in time, tech giants began to combine their computers with virtual assistants technology and years upon years of collected information to create the first ever ARC. They started out big and cumbersome, with slow processing speed and small memory chips. But as technology developed throughout the decades, some ARCs have become small enough to fit into a student’s backpack, while others are the size of a normal human, receiving and transmitting information from your local bank all the way to International Space Stations.

ARCs are most commonly seen working nowadays, particularly in jobs that do not technically require the human brain to 'think outside the box,' so to speak. The automation of jobs have created an influx of people without one, therefore competition for employment has increased dramatically and aggressively. It means that newly-graduated students have the worst luck looking for work in their field of study, which is partially why Jaehyun part-times at a vintage-style cafe with another university student, Johnny.

Back to ARC's.

There’s a running joke that the first ARC was created to satisfy a scientist’s robotic sex fetish, but in reality, their existence becomes more justifiable when applied to environments like hospitals and nursing homes, where any kind words and thoughtful gestures go a long way. Their facial emotions are programmed to be pleasant and professional, their voices warm with patience and understanding. Even their eyes, the supposed gates to the human soul, react to light the way humans' do. The only visible signs that give them away are the six tell-tale holes in the back of their necks. Two columns, three rows.

All technological booms start the same way. First, it's a fad. Then it evolves into a utilitarian tool, reimagined and reinvented and redesigned, finessed to an art. Finally, it becomes an affordable, widespread phenomenon where everyone and their mothers (and their grandmothers) have it.

An ARC is no different. But it's still in its early stages of development, and thus, less cost effective than the late 21st century super laptops. Jaehyun thinks back to the laptop at home who talks back at him, and whirrs and groans whenever he assigns it a task. It’s not very helpful.

Which is why Jaehyun watches, with poorly-concealed interest and jealousy, as Johnny snaps his fingers in front of Taeil, waking the ARC up. It greets the two with a friendly smile.

“Hey Johnny, Jaehyun. How are you today?” He asks, voice pleasant and melodic.

“Just peachy.” Johnny smiles and hands Taeil a thin sheet of optix glass. “Can you draw up the report from last night?”

Taeil takes the glass while looking at his surroundings and frowns. “Aren’t you at work?”

Johnny snorts and waves a hand dismissively. “We’ve had two patrons the entire day. It’s the last hour, Kibum won’t mind.”

Taeil looks at Jaehyun for confirmation, who shrugs in return.

To be very honest, Jaehyun’s still not used to how human-like ARCs can be. It’s all programmed, but it doesn’t make the product any less… strange, somehow. Or maybe Jaehyun needs to get over this uncanny valley, because he’s decades too late to complain about it anyway.

Taeil nods after a moment and pushes the glass against a bag of coffee beans. Johnny gently detaches two thin blue optic cords from the back of his neck to snap into the glass, and Taeil’s eyes glow white. The glass loads up the information as the metal bar at the base of the glass projects a keyboard in front of the glass.

Johnny pulls a tall stool from the other side of the bar, cracks his knuckles, and begins to type.

This isn’t the first time Jaehyun’s seen Johnny do this, but it fascinates him every time.

“Not that I mind, but are you gonna keep staring?” Johnny’s question snaps Jaehyun out of his reverie.

He looks away quickly. “Sorry.”

“Still looking to get one?” Asks a gentle voice.

Jaehyun nods at Taeil. “The lowest tier cost at least two month’s rent. But I can’t afford it right now.”

Taeil makes a noise of sympathy and grows quiet, like contemplating something. After a pause, he perks up. “Would you like me to find the latest deals? There are always some that are a year or two old, but still in great condition.”

Jaehyun smiles and shakes his head. “I have around 1,200 credits in my bank, most of which will go into my rent by the end of this month. I’ll look into it when I have enough to start saving.”

Taeil makes another sound like he wants to say something, but thinks better of it, and pulls back into the resting position. Jaehyun raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t press further. With nothing else better to do, he meanders to the storefront, watching the lights blink on down the street.

It’s a long day, but at least it’s ending soon. The sun is setting, painting the sky with coral, violet, and cobalt hues.

As time passes, the pinks of the sky disappear slowly, mixing the palette and greying the sky. His eyes fall half-lidded and as he stares into the horizon, lined with skyscrapers and the occasional satellite scraping along the clouds.

The door chimes, and Kibum pokes his head around the corner.

“Hey boss.” Johnny calls from the back, quickly putting Taeil and the glass away.

“Hey, Kibum.” Jaehyun echoes with a quirk of a smile.

“It's Key. Stop making me repeat myself.” Key snips, eyes zooming into the optix glass in Johnny’s hand. “Was the day busy? What were you working on?”

“It’s always slow on a Sunday,” Johnny replies, waving a hand casually as he sidesteps the second question.

Key hums quietly, inspecting the machine, beans, and the payment machine history. It is a black box ten inches diagonally, with an optix glass attached to the side, and a red holographic projection above. The machine beeps after he punches a few numbers into the optix number pad, and he nods. “Alright, you guys can go home. I’ll close up.”

Jaehyun and Johnny shout their excitement as they make a beeline to change in the back room, reappearing a moment later.

“See you tomorrow, boss!” Johnny calls over his shoulder.

“It’s Key!” Comes the annoyed response.

Jaehyun bites back a chuckle. “What a way to flirt,” he teases as they step down the stairs, pushing past the white gates and into the hilly path.

The corners of Johnny’s lips quirk up. “He’s cute, but not my type.”

Jaehyun raises a brow in mock surprise. “You have a type?”

“Yeah, the type that isn’t taken. Don’t you know anything about Key? He’s been married to his android for almost five years now.” Johnny pauses at the crossroads. “Are you going home?”

Jaehyun shakes his head after a pause. “I'm going to the library. I wasn’t aware that that was legal in Korea.”

“They went to Paris.” Johnny smiles and checks the time on his band. “My bus is coming in five. I’ll see you later?”

Jaehyun nods. “Yeah. See you.”

They split ways, and Jaehyun heads to the opposite direction for the library. He has a research paper about the effectiveness of past incarceration systems due in two weeks that he should get started on.

It may come as a surprise, but Jaehyun is planning to enter the force after graduation. A detective, to be exact. He’s in his fourth year at the National Police Academy, the most prestigious policing university in Korea, and to say that it’s been a challenge is an understatement. While he passes the physicals with flying colours, he’s weaker with technology-related studies. But his discipline, intelligence and strong observational skills and understanding of human psychology has earned praises from professors. Praises, awards, and letters of recommendation for scholarships. It’s how the cost of his education is completely covered.

But the cost of living in the city of Seoul is a different matter altogether.

Transportation- magnetic trains, hover cars and bikes- continues to be dependable and affordable, food is still dirt cheap and delicious, but the rent… it makes his wallet bleed. The closer to the city core, the more expensive it gets. So he lives on the outskirts of Incheon and commutes about an hour each way to and from the Academy.

As for the cafe, it sits atop a hilly area near his apartment, an old French-inspired architecture of blues and whites amidst a clutter of identical three-story cement buildings. A blue rose amongst mundane red and grey.

Jaehyun’s always had a soft spot for tactile things, and working an espresso machine is everything that has to do with touch, practice, perfection. Although the service industry can be stressful, he learns a lot about dealing with all kinds of people. He calls it training. Johnny thinks it’s because he can’t find a part-time job in his field, which, there are rarely any internship positions in crime investigation departments anyway, so his point is moot.

Johnny, on the other hand, studies architecture at Seoul National University, and he often laments on the fact that people no longer design architecture as they once did. For beauty, not how well it functions.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out why Johnny works at the café.

The library is a bus ride away. It's open to the wee hours in the evening and, much like most other government subsidized facilities, is guarded at all entrances by detectors. Detectors for the black wrist band on everyone.

It's government issued, for tracking and identity purposes, or so they say. Most people go with it, not because they’re fooled by the government-issued notice, but because they believe they’ll never find themselves on the other side of the law. But there is also the underlying threat that if it’s damaged or forcibly removed, the person in question will be apprehended and questioned (read: interrogated).

Fear incites obedience. Then, over time, that becomes complacency.

As a future law enforcer, Jaehyun understands and respects that laws are necessary, but he doesn’t agree with the current ones at play. Still, he holds onto the hope that things can change. Until then, the band is pretty good with telling the time, so at least it’s not completely useless.

He makes his way to a public super-computer, accesses his student account, starts a new document, and starts typing.

Hours pass.

Jaehyun doesn’t leave the library until 2 am. His assignment is a few thousand words in and uploaded onto the Student Cloud System. The buses have stopped running an hour ago, so he hitches the backpack tight across his shoulders and walks home.

It’s almost 3 am when he reaches his apartment. The air has cooled considerably, and the lamppost reveals a thin layer of fog in front of him. Which is why he doesn’t see the figure laying beside the apartment garbage station until he's two feet away. Then he jumps, a yelp almost ripping from his throat. His pulse quickens.

Did he just stumble into a murder scene?

He takes a cautious step forward, then another. The body doesn’t move. His breath becomes shallow as he approaches. From this distance, he can see more clearly. It’s a young man, with a head of silvery white hair, laying on his side at the foot of the garbage station. He commits all of the details to memory, and checks the time for good measure. Finally he looks up again, and calls out, “Hey, can you hear me?”

The body doesn’t respond.

He frowns and takes a step closer, then realizes the figure is wrapped in surgical bandages. But there’s no trace of blood, nor are there any blood trails leading up to the garbage station. He steadies his breathing and crouches low, but still at least a foot away.

“Hey.” He tries again. But the figure doesn’t even move.

_ Fuck– _

Wait.

Six ports. Two columns. Three rows. On the back of his- its neck.

It’s an ARC.


	2. 02

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who gave this story a second chance. I'm surprised there are so many of you, and it's sweet and humbling all at once. Trust me when I say I won't take this for granted, I really won't. Thank you for the comments, bookmarks, subscriptions and kudos. I don't write based on stats, but when you take the time to leave a little something behind, it lets me know someone out there actually likes what I write. Again, truly humbling. Enjoy this next chapter <3

The air feels frozen in Jaehyun’s lungs until he takes the next breath, and falls backwards into an unceremonious heap of nerves and bones.

It’s only an ARC.

He exhales loudly as the tension in his stomach fizzes into annoyance. Who in their right mind would wrap surgical bandages around and ARC before throwing them out? At an apartment garbage station, no less. He was seconds away from alerting the police and giving his first ever record, all because of improper trash disposal. He would’ve looked like an idiot before he even enters the force. Scowling, he rises to his feet and turns back to his apartment.

Then an idea pops in his head: one man’s garbage is another man’s treasure.

He turns slowly, taking in the bandaged ARC in with growing interest. It’s discarded, likely broken, but Doyoung boasts that he can take apart and put together any ARCs, and Sicheng prides in being able to fix any bugs in the ARC program, so there is a chance that he can own a functional ARC without having to pay an arm and a leg for it. There’s a chance he can own a full-sized ARC.

And what’s the worst that can happen? If the ARC doesn’t turn on, he can throw it out again (and dispose it properly so that it would not look like a murder scene). He has nothing to lose.

With his mind made, he crouches in front of the ARC and carefully heaves it into his arms. It’s lighter than he expects. He always thought robots would be heavy, but this one is light. Light enough that he can carry it without too much trouble. Light enough to almost feel like a human in his arms… A shiver runs up his spine.

He shakes his head and buries the thought.

The stairs looked daunting at first glance, but he’s been on a personalized training schedule to improve his strength and agility, so he bounds up the steps to the third floor without breaking too much sweat. His apartment door unlocks from proximity, and he lets himself in.

“Lights,” he calls out, carefully stepping out of his sneakers while balancing the ARC in his arms. The warm incandescents blink on as he shuffles into the living area, settling ARC on his unmade futon. And then he stares, quite openly, that if he saw himself, he’d probably flush with embarrassment. Because the ARC is beautiful. Very beautiful. It has fair skin, almost transparent grey-silver hair, and strong, angular facial features.

Jaehyun knows they’re made to be visually pleasing. Humans have sought after aesthetic appeal since the beginning of time. But the knowledge of it didn’t hit quite as soundly with any other ARC than it did with this one, and he doesn’t know what to make of it.

Is this really his?

After another pause of momentary disbelief, he starts unwrapping the ARC unit, which turns out to be an arduous task. Surgical bandages are a thing of the past, most wounds and openings are often covered by plastic bandage wrapping these days. Maybe the previous owner was an old person who didn’t know how to- oh. Wow.

The ARC is anatomically accurate.

Internally rolling his eyes (and physically averting his gaze to the ground) Jaehyun finishes up with the bandages and collects them in a heap and off to the side. He gives the ARC unit a cursory glance over and concludes that apart from a small bludgeon under its right eye, it is unmarred. Jaehyun takes another glance at it, feels his cheeks turn pink, and turns to wet a towel. He gives the ARC a quick wipe-down, it was sitting in the trash after all, then pulls on his smallest sweatpants over the ARC’s legs and lower region. There’s no need for that much junk to be hanging out.

The next course of action comes logically: turn on the ARC.

Which should be easy. He’s seen it before. Johnny snaps his fingers in front of Taeil to wake him up. So maybe?

He snaps his fingers in front of the ARC. Nothing happens.

Not that, then.

For the first time in his life, Jaehyun wished he paid attention to Doyoung and Sicheng when they blabbered on and on about ARCs. He taps on his band, and the holographic time reads 3:38 AM. It’s too late to call either of them. He grumbles under his breath and, after a pause, unlatches the green cords from the back of the ARC’s neck and plugs them into the wall sockets. ARCs need power to turn on, right? Johnny’s done this before too.

Nothing response.

_ This might take a while because it’s an old model _ , he tells himself. So he waits a minute. Then five. Then ten. By fifteen, he grows impatient and bounces his leg restlessly. So he digs out his old super-computer, a hand-me-down from his mother, and taps on the bottom bar to turn it on. The holographic lens flickers to a neon glow.

“Authentication: Jung Jaehyun.”

The machine whirs and beeps after a pause. “Authentication accepted. Welcome back, Jaehyun.”

“Connect to web. Authentication fourteen-oh-two. Search for ways to turn on an ARC.”

The fan of the super-computer emits a worrying hum, its old lights blinking wildly as the connection is established. After a pause: “Found over fifteen thousand articles.”

Jaehyun wrinkles his nose. “Read the most recent and most visited one.”

The response comes seconds later: “One. Greet it by its model number. It should turn on automatically.”

Jaehyun rolls his eyes. There’s no way he’d know that information. “Keep listing.”

“Two. Ensure your ARC is plugged into the wall. It should automatically turn on. Three. If your ARC is an older model, try pressing and holding the kill switch for five seconds. It will automatically reboot the system.”

Jaehyun snorts. Press and hold the kill switch? That’s such an early 21st century thing. But if an old person wrapped this ARC in surgical bandage, there’s a chance this ARC is an older model as well. So he looks for a switch.

Minutes later, he growls in frustration because there is not one switch or button, protruded or hidden, on the smooth skin of this ARC. He’s looked at every nook and crevice, even in the mouth and under the eyelids, which brought on a new set of unsettling feelings that he’s not about to explore. Nothing.

“Computer, are there any other ways to turn an ARC on?”

“There are other methods such as installing third-party debug systems, or sending the ARC back to its manufacturer for a full-check up to locate the issue. Would you like to hear about those options?”

Jaehyun sighs in exhaustion, falling onto his back and glancing at the silver-haired ARC. This is a lot harder than he anticipated. He’ll probably need Doyoung and Sicheng’s help with this. There’s no way he’d be able to figure this technology stuff on his own. Plus, it is eating into his precious sleeping hours, and it’s been a very long day. So with a mighty groan, he washes up and gets ready for bed.

The ARC is still on the futon, but he doesn’t know where else to put it.

“Lights off,” he calls tiredly as he climbs under futon.

He’s seconds away from drifting to sleep when he sees it. There’s a soft, red glow. And it’s coming from the ARC’s ear.

“Lights at twenty-five,” he says urgently, climbing to his knees. Low yellow blinks on and he leans over, inspecting closely.

It’s an earring, and it’s vibrating with the red glow.

Unthinkingly, Jaehyun reaches to touch it. It pulses and hums on his fingertip. He takes a shallow breath, then brings his other hand to the back of the ear, and snaps it off.

The two pieces fall on Jaehyun’s palm and a sharp electrical charge shoots through his hand, but what captures his attention is the ARC in front of him. It glows pale white from between the planes of muscle folds under the synthetic skin- muscles with grooves and definition just like a human– and its mouth opens slightly. Its chest expands like it’s taking a deep, stuttering breath, then another breath, and its starts coughing–

Like it has lungs.

The body convulses and curls as the coughs rattle its entirety– it’s almost as if the lungs are getting used to air-

Jaehyun watches in equal parts of horror and fascination.

The ARC flips to its side, the power cords rip out from the motion and flies back into its neck. Then slowly the glow dims into the body and the coughing subsides.

Jaehyun slumps down with a soft exhale, not realizing that he was holding his breath in the first place, and tries to calm his rapidly beating heart. What the fuck was that.

Then, it opens its eyes and Jaehyun catches sight of piercing grey.

Jaehyun freezes. Never has he seen such arresting grey eyes. Not even with implants and augmentation does anything comes remotely close. They look ethereal, so ethereal that he feels rooted to the spot. A small voice in his head wonders if this is how all ARCs come to life, but it disappears when the ARC blinks, then turning to meet his gaze.

After a long moment, Jaehyun approaches the ARC with a cautious, “Hey.”

The ARC doesn’t respond and continues to stare at him.

Jaehyun clears his throat and tries again. “I’m Jaehyun,” he introduces, gesturing to himself.

The grey eyes that zero in on his hand has Jaehyun unconsciously moving backwards. That was not a friendly look. In fact, the ARC wears the expression of his unimpressed high school physics teacher after handing back his report, a red 42 circled at the top. Is this normal? Do all ARCs act this way when they’re switched on for the first time? Jaehyun purses his lips.

“Do you understand what I’m saying?” He ventures slowly, frowning and cocking his head to the side.

The ARC tilt its head. It doesn’t respond, but Jaehyun sees something flicker through its eyes, like recognition, so he tries again.

“Do you understand me?”

After a pause the ARC nods slowly, and Jaehyun feels the tension bleed from his muscles. It understands. He can work with this. Excitement bubbles from his stomach. “This is good. No, this is  _ amazing _ . It’s like Christmas came early! What are your capabilities? What can you do?” He frowns. “I hope your language centre isn’t damaged or destroyed. But you understand me so that’s probably not the case, right?”

The ARC nods again, though Jaehyun notes a hint of amused exasperation in his eyes. Or maybe he’s just imagining it. ARCs don’t emote, do they?

“What do I call you? Do you have a model code? Serial number?”

The ARC pauses, processing the question. Then:

“ARC-950701.”

Each character is carefully enunciated with even pauses. But Jaehyun is most surprised by its voice. It’s deeper than he expects, and smoother. Almost spoken with a melodic rhythm. He’s thinking too much. “Cool. What are you programmed with?”

“The language centre.”

Jaehyun blinks, surprised. Is the ARC trying to make a joke? He shakes his head. “And a dry humour too, it seems.”

“It seems so,” echoes ARC-950701 and, miraculously, the corner of its mouth quirks up.

_ So, this ARC emotes. _

Maybe ARC-950701 was programmed by a student to have a snarky attitude, and when it got too annoying, too snarky, was wiped and discarded? But it exercised enough apprehension to respond in a roundabout way, so is this related to the personality or the security system?

“Any security systems I should be aware of?” Jaehyun asks, curiosity piqued.

Again, the ARC tilts its head.

“I guess that’s I don’t know?” He nods at the ARC who nods back… hold on a second.

“Wait, what are you?”

“I’m ARC-950701.” Comes the response, in the same tone Jaehyun introduced himself, including the hand that gestured at himself.

“What is a language centre?” Jaehyun presses.

It stares back like it doesn’t know. Then Jaehyun understands.

The ARC doesn’t know anything else but its model number– it’s as clean a slate as they come. It’s learning through speech patterns and observations. It’s learning from  _ him. _ The magnitude of that piece of information shocks Jaehyun into a brief silence. For the ARC to be able to speak and understand him is incredible. And it’s only been on for less than ten minutes. Christ.

“It’s how you’re able to communicate with me,” explains Jaehyun, almost like he’s talking to himself. “Though now I’m less sure that you have one, and that you’re only learning by observation.”

He does a quick calculation in his head. It’ll take some time to implement the new programs, but he’s sure either Doyoung or Sicheng can help. Plus, he’s tired. The ARC turns on, it likely won’t explode, progress can wait. He nods to himself, and a pause later, the ARC also nods.

...well. This feels nothing short of monkey see, monkey do. And as excited as he could be for finding an ARC, he’s really, really tired.

“Now that that’s out of the way, I should really sleep.”

The ARC eyes at him curiously. “What is a sleep?”

Jaehyun pauses, turning to look at ARC-950701. Right. Self-learning capabilities.

“It is, ‘What is sleep?’” He corrects, and the ARC nods in acknowledgment. “It’s a necessity. A state in which the body and brain of a human- wait, a body is… man, this is hard.”

ARC-950701 blinks. “What is a hard? What is hard?”

“Second one,” Jaehyun confirms, holding up two fingers. Grey eyes stare at his hands then at him, nodding. “Hard is the opposite of easy.” He raises his hands, pinching one side’s index finger and thumb while widening the space in the other. “Easy is when accomplishing something takes little effort, hard is when it takes a lot of effort.”

Again, the ARC nods once, and Jaehyun continues.

“Sleep is when the human brain– well. Okay. So, I am a human. I am made up of parts, like bones, muscles, organs like the brain that keeps me alive. I have a heart here-” He points to his chest. “It’s to pump blood around my body. Humans are complex beings. We can also be fragile, and have specific needs to be met for survival. For example, you need electricity,” He points at the outlet in the wall. “I need food, water, air and sleep. And sleep is when I close my eyes and rest. My body and brain are doing the least amount of work so that I can recharge to keep going.”

There’s no outward acknowledgment, but Jaehyun sees from its eyes that the ARC is processing all of this information like it’s thinking.

The ARC has incredibly emotive eyes.

“Anyway, I need to sleep. But we can, um, I can teach you more things tomorrow. Okay?”

ARC-950701 blinks.

“Good night.”

“...good night.”

Other than the fact that they’ve successfully communicated in one conversation, there is no concrete way to confirm that the ARC actually understands what he’s saying. With slowness, Jaehyun slips between the sheets and orders the lights to dim again. The ARC props itself against the wall, so the cords don’t stretch too far. They watch each other for a while, but with time, Jaehyun’s eyelids droop with fatigue, and he falls asleep.


	3. 03

The morning sun spills into the quaint room like a stifling warm blanket. Jaehyun crawls out from under his bedsheets and buries his face into the futon with a long groan. He doesn’t recall opening the blinds yesterday, he’d been out the whole day and only returning in the evening when he found–

Finds silver eyes staring at him from above.

Jaehyun screams, scrambling to sit up. The ARC eyes at him with a curious tilt to its head.

“Jesus fucking Christ don’t do that again.”

The ARC blinks. “Jesus fuck…ing–?”

_ Right _ , it’s learning.

“No!” He leaps forward, waving his arms in the air. The ARC takes a step back, eyes widening. “No, those. Those are bad words. Don’t repeat them. Definitely don’t repeat them.”

The ARC frowns like he wants to disagree, but nods at the end. Jaehyun sighs and slumps to the floor, running a hand tiredly through his hair and tapping on the black band for the time. It’s only 8:50 am. He doesn’t need to be up for another hour. He should be sleeping right now.

“What is that?”

Jaehyun follows the ARC’s curious gaze to the holographic time projected by the band, and turns his wrist. “It’s a watch. It tells the time.”

“What is time?”

Oh boy, where to start with that answer. “It’s,” he pauses, scratching the back of his head. “It’s a measurement, I think. Actually, it might be a dimension. I’m not really sure what time is. I don’t think we’ve figured it out yet. Maybe we have. Shit, I’m butchering this explanation. Remind me to bring you to the library some time.”

The ARC stares at him, then at the watch, and nods slowly. Jaehyun doesn’t blame it. He knows he’s incoherent before the first cup of coffee. And seeing as how the ARC has taken to staring at him while he sleeps (which is enough to keep him  _ from _ sleeping), there’s no way to fall back to sleep now. Maybe some coffee will help make sense of everything, or something. Like how he’s managed to acquire an ARC, for starters. He makes a beeline for the cupboard storing the coffee beans.

“‘Some time’?”

Oh dear.

“Um. That is a figure of speech. Wait, no it’s not, because I do intend to bring you to one.” Jaehyun shakes his head to clear his thoughts. “Okay, watch this.”

He lifts his wrist up and taps on the band again, which projects the digits into the air above it.

“Time is quantified by milliseconds, seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades, centuries and millenniums. There are probably more measurements of time that I don’t know, but those are the basics. Look at this." He points to the seconds, ticking away. "These are seconds. The count up from zero, that's this number, the next is one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, then which it resets to zero, but adds one to the next digit. See how that turned into a five?"

The ARC nods, staring closely at the holographic clock. Jaehyun continues.

"There are sixty seconds in one minute. Sixty minutes in one hour. And twenty four hours in one day. Seven days in a week. Fifty two weeks in a year. There are roughly three hundred and sixty five days a year, unless it’s a leap year, in which there is one extra day- February twenty nine. Following me so far?"

The frown on the ARC’s face is massive, but the look in its eyes is one of resolution, not confusion. It nods. "What does ten look like?"

"I’ll write it out for you later," Jaehyun replies. “Numbers are also associated with prefixes, that is, parts of a word that are attached to the beginning of the word to add meaning. For example, deca is ten, cent is one hundred, and millennia is one thousand. So by relation, a decade is?"

"Ten years. A century is one hundred years. And a millennium is one thousand years."

Jaehyun smiles to himself. Teaching might be easier than he expects, if the ARC is this quick, this intelligent.

“So that’s time. It is not something you can see. But things happen with the passing of it, and units are introduced to quantify it. For example, I met you yesterday, which was around four hours ago-”

And so Jaehyun explains this while he pours some beans into the grinder, sets the coarse level to _Fine_, and hits the ON button. The ARC watches with unblinking eyes as the beans are grounded into a gritty fine powder, which is then automatically deposited into another compartment of the machine, and water starts boiling. At that point, it looks personally offended at the machine. Jaehyun observes him with barely concealed amusement.

“What is this?” It asks, pointing at the machine.

“A drip coffee machine. There aren’t too many of these models left, especially since replicators have become more popular. Still not affordable. Also, replicated coffee just lacks something," Jaehyun explains.

“Replicator?”

“It’s a machine that reconstitutes matter into food. Recipes are loaded into the machine, which uses a power source to create food. But I’m not sure of the specifics. Magic happens in the back end, I guess.”

The machine beeps once, and brown liquid pools in the glass pot at the bottom. Jaehyun pours himself a generous helping of coffee, and lifts the cup up to the ARC’s nose. The frown on the ARC’s forehead deepens after it inhales.

“Is this coffee?” It asks, nose wrinkling at the dark liquid.

“The one and only.” Jaehyun nods with a smile. He blows on the steam a little, and takes an experimental sip before blowing on the surface some more.

“Why do you do that?”

“To cool it down. It’d be too hot to drink otherwise.”

“What is too hot?”

“Hot is a word used to describe the temperature of something. The opposite of hot is cold. Give me your hand.” Jaehyun points at the ARC’s hand, and it raises it slightly. He holds onto the wrist and gently presses the hot cup on the ARC’s palm for two seconds. “Feel that? That’s heat.”

“So the coffee is hot.”

“Yes,” Jaehyun nods. He puts down the cup and strides over to his small fridge, where he pulls out a french press that is half-full.

“Is this coffee?”

“Cold brew, I can teach you how to make it some time.” Jaehyun nods. “Give me your hand.”

Again, the ARC raises its hand, but when Jaehyun presses the cold glass against its palm, it pulls its hand away quickly, staring at the fogged glass in shock. It doesn’t like the cold. Go figure. Jaehyun fights back a smile, and places the cold brew back in the fridge.

“That’s cold. You can feel the difference, right?”

“Of course,” the ARC replies with a hint of offense in his voice, like he’s surprised Jaehyun’s asking. Jaehyun smiles.

He extends a hand between them, palm up. “Give me your hand again.”

ARC-950701 eyes at it with an air of distrust. “What temperature are you going to show me this time?”

“Human body temperature, to give you context.”

“Context?”

“How it feels to me, through my perception.”

After a pause of hesitation, the ARC extends its hand and places it, palm down, on Jaehyun’s hand. Jaehyun lets it sit there for a moment, and nods. “Water boils at a hundred degrees, and the coffee loses heat once it’s no longer under the heat source. The fridge is about two degrees, the low temperature prevents food from spoiling. It also means the cold brew is around two degrees, since it’s been in the fridge. Following so far?”

ARC-950701 nods, staring at their connected hands.

“On average, the human body is thirty seven degrees. The cold from the fridge affects humans less than the heat from the boiling water, which can actually be dangerous. Heat destroys cells, and can leave these things called burns on human skin. Extreme cold temperatures can do the same, too. It’s called a frostbite. If a burn or frostbite become serious or extreme, the affected body part may be amputated.”

The ARC stares at him.

Jaehyun slowly drops his hand to his side, and the ARC slowly retracts his hand as well. He watches a light flicker across the ARC’s eyes, like a human would when he understands something, and feels the unease in his stomach dispels. The ARC is learning. He’s not sure what the ARC is learning, but it is learning. He’s not fucking this up. He’s got this.

“Anyway, let’s sit,” he suggests, walking to the common area. He hastily kicks away the bedcovers and futon, and places his coffee down. “It’s a little late for introductions, but too much happened last night, and I was running on very little sleep, so let’s do it now.”

The ARC mimics his actions and sits cross-legged opposite to him. Jaehyun flashes a brief grin before speaking, “I’m Jaehyun, a fourth year university student at National Police Academy, majoring in Criminology and minoring in Psychology. I like coffee, sports and singing, but not many know about the last one.”

He watches as the ARC absorbs the information with a light of acknowledgment in its eyes, and continues. “I go to school in Seoul, which is about half an hour into the city. Besides that, I’m working part time as a barista in a cafe ten minutes that way– that is, I make coffee and get paid for it.”

The ARC’s gaze follows the direction he vaguely points at, past a wall, and turns back to him, wearing a confused expression.

“Not literally that way. The cafe is up a hill, past the main intersection.”

Nod.

“I can show you later, if you’d like.”

A swifter nod.

Jaehyun chuckles. “I have to go to school today, so I will be gone for a few hours.”

Nod.

“It’s 9:23 am right now. I have a class at 12 pm, and another one at 3 pm. After that, I’ll come home. Sound good?”

Nod.

“In that case,” he downs the rest of the coffee, and stands to his feet. “I’ll shower now. Wait here.”

The ARC looks faintly alarmed. “Where are you going? What is shower?”

Jaehyun looks surprised, then remembers. “I don’t suppose ARCs shower, do they?”

ARC-950701 stares back, not knowing what to say.

“Nevermind.” Jaehyun shakes his head and waves it off. “I shower to wash off any grime and dirt. It’s a way to clean myself. I go to the bathroom to shower. That’s this room.” He gestures to the room that lights up with motion sensor. The ARC squints from the light, then follows Jaehyun into the bathroom, which he didn’t expect. Also, it's kind of weird to be talking to someone in the shower. He stops the ARC mid-step.

“Wait out here.”

“Why?”

“Why? Showers are for one person only.”  _ Unless you’re having a shower of a rather sexy nature, _ his mind supplies unhelpfully. Jaehyun promptly turns it off and brushes it under the rug. These are not the thoughts he should be having.

“How about this. I’ll keep the door open so you can come in if there’s an emergency. Otherwise, you’re standing outside of the bathroom, and you can’t peek, until I’m done.”

“What is an emergency?”

_ Uh. _ “When something really bad happens. Really, really bad. Like, fire, gas leaks, death-threatening injuries, et cetera. Just stay outside and don’t peek, okay?”

The ARC stares at him for a long time, before nodding and slowly moving out of the bathroom.

“I’ll still be here,” Jaehyun calls after him.

With the ARC gone, he takes a quick shower and feels more refreshed and alive. It’s almost like he’s relishing in this strangely earned personal time and space, and he doesn’t know how to feel about that. Is this what it’s like to have an ARC? He’s never really seen Johnny like this with Taeil, nor his other friends Doyoung and Sicheng doing this with their mini ARCs, but maybe they’ve done this, and he’s just never paid attention.

He absentmindedly reaches for the towel on the wall, wiping himself dry before wrapping it loosely around his hips. Then he brushes his teeth as his mind wanders again.

ARC-950701 feels almost like a cat. With the way it is curious about everything, and especially with the way it doesn’t like to be left behind. What was that called again, object permanence? He needs to teach it that even if he had left its view, he hasn’t gone away forever.

He looks out into the living room and sees the silver-haired ARC eyeing curiously at the kitchenware on the counter; more specifically, the knife block.

“Don’t touch those, they can be dangerous.” Jaehyun warns through the toothbrush and bubbles.

The ARC looks at him, then at the knife block, and then, pretending it was not interested in the first place, skulks away. Jaehyun bites back a smile and spits out the foam. It’s almost like the ARC has a  _ personality _ .

The ARC shifts its attention to the objects on his shelf, which mainly comprise of his old textbooks, binders of notes, a few non-fiction books he’s picked up or were given to him, a scented candle, and a stuffed toy. The curiosity that teems out of the android is obvious as the day, and he wonders if this, too, is common.

The ARC looks at him once, then at the books again, and he nods. It reaches for a book and touches the spine.

“What is this?”

“A book.”

“What is a book?”

“It’s a collection of papers that holds information.”

“Information?”

“Unspecific, can be anything.” He smiles, plucking the book out of the shelf and opening it to the middle. “Books can be categorized in different ways, but the most common one is fiction and nonfiction. Fiction means that the information is not completely real. Nonfiction means that the information is real.”

The ARC nods quietly, turning its silver eyes to the pages. It looks like it's thinking. “What is this book?”

Jaehyun blinks. “Non-fiction. This is a textbook from a class I took last year, Psychology and the Law.”

Silver eyes blink at him.

“Aha, well, I could tell you about it, but it’s probably easier to just read the textbook. I’m not that good at paraphrasing the information.” Jaehyun coughs, scratching the back of his neck sheepishly.

“Read?”

“I can teach you. It’s easy. No wait, it’s kind of easy, once you know the exceptions to every rule. So it’s actually kinda hard. But it’ll be easy once you get the hang of it.”

“Hang of it?”

Jaehyun takes a deep breath, and counts to ten.

“Okay, let’s, um. Let’s start with the basics.”

And so, for the first time in his life, Jaehyun finds himself giving an impromptu language lesson to an ARC. He’d never expect something like this to happen, but he’d never expect to happen upon a discarded ARC either. It’s all kind of overwhelming, even the language lesson. He’s no linguist, and he doesn’t have a penchant for languages, but still he tries his best. He also makes more coffee.

After an hour, he can say with a degree of certainty that the ARC learns better than he teaches.

And it is then that he realizes he has to head out to school, so he fumbles through his clothes (he’d only been wearing a pair of boxers up until that point), hastily packs his bag, and pours the last helping of coffee into a clean tumbler before tugging on his sneakers.

“I’ll be back in a few hours,” he announces from the ground, tying his shoelaces.

The ARC stares at him. “How many is a few?”

Jaehyun blows the hair out of his face and taps on the black band. “Around 6 pm, which is around six hours from now. I’ll be bringing some friends over.”

The ARC nods eventually. It’s as solid an acknowledgment as he’ll get. He straightens his clothes and clears his throat awkwardly. What do people normally say?

“Be good. I’ll see you in a few hours.”

Gee, that was awkward. He doesn’t expect the ARC to respond, which is why when the pink lips pull into a small smile, he stills in his steps.

Wow.

That was cute.

Okay.

“Right. Bye.”

The door closes behind him as he walks like a robot down the stairs and through the gates. He hasn’t had enough sleep to begin deciphering what that means, but he’s becoming more convinced that he’s not mentally capable of anymore thinking, and he should stop.

It’ll make sense eventually. Somehow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Behold, their first proper conversation!! Jaehyun is taking bravy baby steps at this new tech thing. The ARC too is taking strong baby steps, which is probably more like leaps and bounds in human equivalent *cough*spoiler*cough*. Progress! :D
> 
> Thank you everyone for following this story! I know this probably isn't everyone's cup of tea, so thank you for your love and support <3 I'm humbled to have you as the audience >< 
> 
> Next chapter: Doyoung and Sicheng meet ARC-950701. A little touch, a little surprise ;) Stay tuned!


	4. 04

Jaehyun goes about his day as usual, or as much as he can with the thoughts of an ARC crossing his mind ever so often.

He knows he’s distracted. But hell, anyone would be if they came across a free ARC that seems to be in good working condition. Sure, the ARC needs a couple of new systems to do what he needs to make his life easier, but those are actually _ affordable _. He’s also pretty sure Doyoung and Sicheng would have spare or older systems, but damn-

A full sized ARC.

It’s a dream come true.

He shoots a quick message to Sicheng and Doyoung, suggesting a time and place for them to meet, and tries to tune back to class. Half an hour left.

•••

Class ends a bit before 6 pm, and Jaehyun packs up and leaves with uncharacteristic speed. He bounds through the streets to the train station between his and Sicheng and Doyoung’s campus buildings, which is a good twenty minutes away. When he sees their faces through the gates, he waves excitedly before entering.

“You look like shit,” Doyoung says without preamble. Sicheng laughs in agreement.

Jaehyun has half a heart to flip them the bird, but reins it back because he still needs their help. “I’m running on five hours of sleep. Give me a break,” he sneers, flicking a bead of sweat squarely onto Doyoung’s face who screeches loudly.

A teasing smile breaks across Sicheng’s face. “You make it sound like you just became a dad, and now you’re scrambling to take care of the baby.”

Jaehyun lets out a tired groan. “If this is what parenthood is like, I’m never starting a family.”

Doyoung lets out a bark of laughter, eyes crinkling. “It’s an ARC, not a baby. You’re comparing apples to oranges.”

Sicheng chuckles. “True. Can’t imagine Jaehyun being a parent anyway.”

They tap their black wrist bands at the turnstile before being admitted to the otherside. The express train arrives a short moment later, and the three alight the one heading east of the city. They settle on the chairs, and Doyoung pulls out his mini-ARC, Jungwoo, settling the petit android on his lap. He taps Jungwoo’s back, and Jungwoo flickers on. To his other side, Sicheng pulls out his mini-ARC, Kun, and places him on his shoulder. The auburn-haired mini-ARC blinks awake within a moment.

“Sicheng. Hi Doyoung, Jungwoo, Jaehyun.” Kun greets everyone.

“Hey Kun!” Jungwoo chirps back excitedly.

Jaehyun smiles crookedly, waving at the small ARC model. Sicheng bites back a smile.

“I’ve never seen you this interested in ARCs before. Guess owning one does change a person.”

Jaehyun rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. “Honestly, I had no idea what I was supposed to do. It took me ten minutes to turn it on, and a whole conversation to realize it knew nothing but its name, er, serial code.”

Doyoung perks up. “Which is?”

“ARC-950701.”

Doyoung nods at Jungwoo. “Got that?”

Jungwoo nods and goes to work. His eyes glaze over into a light grey film, the only visible sign that shows he’s currently doing… something.

“He’s already looking it up?” Jaehyun asks curiously.

“Of course,” Doyoung quips. “Woo, I’m going to connect the Optix board now.”

Jungwoo nods and Jaehyun expects Doyoung to unplug the latches behind Jungwoo’s neck to connect with the Optix board in his hands, just like Johnny did back in the cafe, but he doesn’t.

“Don’t you need a connection?”

Doyoung smiles conspiratorially. “I made a few changes with Jungwoo recently. Optix board can now be connected contactlessly now. I’m surprised you noticed, I only updated it a few days ago.”

“It’s my job to observe,” Jaehyun explains with a shrug. “How are you supposed to turn on a full-sized ARC anyway?”

“Plug it in,” Sicheng answers.

“Barring that?”

“Well…”

“Possibilities are endless,” interrupts Doyoung. “The ARC you have might be a really, really old model, or it’s completely built from scratch. There’s no information on any ARC-950701 on the net or the dark net.”

“... what you’re doing is borderline illegal and I shouldn’t be listening to this,” mutters Jaehyun. “But okay. Whether it’s really old or built from scratch, how do I know that it’s safe to use?”

Sicheng hums thoughtfully, measuring his words. “Were you able to communicate with it?”

Jaehyun nods. “The ARC picked it up really quickly. Do ARCs do that? Learn new languages on the fly?”

Doyoung and Sicheng look at each other before shaking their heads. “ARCs usually come with the basics; a functional language centre being one of them. It’d be hard to order them to do things otherwise, especially for those who don’t tinker with tech,” Sicheng explains.

Doyoung frowns and starts typing again. Sicheng sticks his palm out and Kun clambers on.

“Kun, connect to Cloud 2118 and tell me all of the systems we have available. Specifically those pertaining to connection to the net and Cloud, and other basic functions. Keys and pass codes must be included.”

Kun’s eyes fade to grey while he carries out his task. But Sicheng moves his hand around, like one would play balancing act with a pet, and Kun’s body moves instinctively to maintain its balance. Jaehyun’s never seen this before.

“If you don’t close your mouth, a fly’s gonna lay eggs in there,” teases Sicheng.

Jaehyun’s jaws snap shut as he glares at a laughing Sicheng.

Doyoung makes a frustrated noise, pausing in his search. “There’s nothing on him. Wait, it’s a guy, right?”

Jaehyun coughs, remembering what he’d seen last night and suppresses the flush on his cheeks. “Yeah.”

“Curious. And interesting.” Doyoung frowns and crosses his arms, a strange glint reflecting from his eyes. “It’s like a whole mystery. I can’t wait to pick it apart.”

Jaehyun raises an eyebrow, but lets it slide. Doyoung tends to get a little obsessive when it comes to ARCs, it’s sometimes all he ever thinks about.

Meanwhile, Kun taps on Sicheng’s shoulder to get his attention, eyes brown and normal again. “I have the results, would you like me to list them?”

Sicheng nods for the mini-ARC to continue. “I found thirty two systems and took the liberty to download the latest categories you’ve noted so we can implement them when we get to Jaehyun’s,” Kun notes.

“Pass codes and everything?”

“Double-checked. They’re good to go,” replies Kun.

Sicheng hums and taps on the band on his wrist, but it’s not the government issued one, it’s his own design- a twist of prussian blue lined with bronze. Kun perks up with excitement. A small dashboard is projected from it, and Sicheng clicks on a few more buttons. “Here.”

“What did you do?” Doyoung asks. Jaehyun also watch the exchange curiously.

“He’s recently taken to old 3D spatial puzzles, so I designed more challenging variations as rewards, or incentives.” Sicheng smiles, lifting Kun to his shoulder again. “Thanks, Kun.”

The mini-ARC doesn’t respond. He’s already lost to the world, eyes glazed over as he picks apart the puzzle pieces in his virtual reality. It’s strange, Jaehyun decides. But fascinating. Jungwoo eyes meaningfully at Kun. Doyoung chuckles under his breath, lifting Jungwoo from his shoulder to place him beside Kun.

“Kun, can I join?” Jungwoo asks shyly.

Kun’s eyes turn brown and he grins enthusiastically. “Yeah, I’ll add your connection!”

Jungwoo’s eyes pulse blue, then turn to the normal brown, then white, like Jun’s.

Doyoung catches Jaehyun’s wide-eyed expression and chuckles.

“If this is how ARCs are supposed to behave, I’m not sure the ARC I picked up is normal,” Jaehyun admits slowly.

Doyoung snorts. “What you see is a product of tweaking. A lot of tweaking,” he boasts, puffing his chest. “Most store-bought mini-ARCs don’t act like this. Sicheng and I went through pretty great lengths to get them to come this far. In fact-”

“Oi–” Sicheng hisses.  
“Hold up–” Jaehyun warns.

Doyoung stops to look around the mostly empty subway car (there aren’t anyone within earshot, thankfully) and raises his hands in mock surrender.

“Just a law abiding citizen doing law-abiding citizen things,” he smirks.

Sicheng sighs and immediate connects both Kun and Jungwoo to his Optix to delete chunks of their audio and black box visual memory. The two mini-ARCs roll their eyes in unison, before going back to their virtual puzzles.

“I don’t know how you’re still a free man sometimes.” Jaehyun shakes his head, watching Doyoung with a mix of amusement and wonder. Sicheng agrees with a sigh of exasperation. He’s not overly fond of altering or clearing Kun’s memories.

“You just get really good at not getting caught.” Doyoung grins cheekily. “Granted, what I said is true. The dark web is no longer illegal, even if it’s still conducts a lot of… eyebrow-raising transactions. I steer far away from those. But it does have a lot of information the public web doesn’t have access to, and that’s what makes it important to go through.”

Jaehyun smiles wryly, leaning back and hugging his bag to his chest. “I don’t know what to do with you sometimes, Kim Doyoung.”

“No one ever does,” Sicheng pipes in. After a few more clicks, he disconnects both mini-ARCs and announces the job complete. The warning glare he shoots at Doyoung goes largely unheeded.  


The sun casts long shadows from their tall frames, and the temperature has dropped a little since the afternoon. Restaurants and shops lights blink bright neon colours as they walk down the narrow street. Soon, Jaehyun leads them up a flight of cement stairs, and the door automatically unlocks. The inside is unexpectedly dark and quiet.

Jaehyun quietly toes off his shoes as he drops his keys in the small bowl by the door. “I’m home,” he calls.

Behind him, Sicheng and Doyoung also take off their shoes. They look around, with Jungwoo and Kun peering out from the folds of their bags.

“Hey?”

The space is not big, but there is no sign of the ARC. Jaehyun frowns and peers around the kitchen, then goes to the bathroom where a silvery-grey head pops out from the corner.

“Whoa-hey!” He stumbles, surprised. “What were you doing in there?”

The ARC looks over his shoulder to the two strangers in the apartment, then its eyes narrow.

_ Ah. _

“They’re my friends Sicheng and Doyoung. I told you about them this morning, remember?” Jaehyun says, pointing behind him. Doyoung and Sicheng stand by the kitchen counter, not sure of how to proceed. The frown on ARC-950701’s face deepens, and it tucks itself more securely behind the wall.

Jaehyun smiles wryly. “Don’t be scared, they don’t bite. At least, Sicheng doesn’t.” He means it as a joke, but the ARC doesn’t pick up on the teasing tone, and stands its ground.

Jaehyun turns back to his friends and shrugs a little. “Well, um, yeah. This is it.”

Both Sicheng and Doyoung’s eyebrows disappear in their hairlines as they openly stare at Jaehyun and ARC-950701. Sicheng snaps out of his reverie first, clearing his throat in embarrassment. “Sorry for staring, I just didn’t expect your ARC to look like, well, this.”

Doyoung nods quickly, taking a step closer. “Yeah, no kidding. He’s really beautiful-”

The ARC bristles and hides himself in the bathroom again. It would’ve been more effective if there isn’t a small mirror on the opposite wall, reflecting how he’s crouched low and looking very, very concerned. Jaehyun looks at the reflection briefly, before waving for Doyoung and Sicheng to move to the living area for now. He slips into the bathroom, finding the silver head of his ARC peeping from the glass of the shower stall.

“Hey, you don’t need to worry about those guys outside. They’re my friends. They’re just here to meet you.”

The ARC doesn’t budge.

“Meet me?”

It’s a little ridiculous to talk between a shower stall, especially when Jaehyun can see his ARC quite clearly.

“Can I come in?”

“...fine.”

Jaehyun steps in.

It’s almost as if he’s cornered the ARC, who looks every bit nervous and uncomfortable about the whole ordeal. Jaehyun has half a heart to be worried, but he also wants the ARC to get used to his friends as soon as possible. How else can they figure out what kind of an ARC it is, where it’s from, and implement all of the different systems Sicheng’s prepared?

“Give me your hand.”

Like the morning exercise, the ARC stares at his outstretched hand for a moment, before placing his palm over his. Jaehyun gently folds his hand around the ARC’s, and catches his eyes in a steady gaze.

“Do you trust me?”

The ARC looks away. “What is trust?”

“It,” Jaehuyn pauses, looking for the right words. “It’s a feeling you have when you believe in someone.”

“Believe?”

“For example, I trusted my empty apartment to you this morning. You trusted your hand with me. You trusted me to teach you.” One corner of Jaehyun’s mouth twitches up. “My friends won’t hurt you. Trust me.”

The ARC stares into his eyes, looking back and forth between his left and right like searching for something. It was a deeply human behaviour. Jaehyun’s gaze doesn’t waver. After a long moment, the ARC nods, and takes a small step forward, tightening his hold around Jaehyun’s grip.

“I trust you.”

Jaehyun smiles, squeezing their connected hands. “Thank you.”

It is like this, Jaehyun and the ARC walking hand in hand out of the bathroom, that has Sicheng raising an eyebrow. Doyoung is busy looking at something on his Optix glass. As they near, Jaehyun sees that he’s ordered pizza delivery.

“Hope you don’t mind pineapples on pizza.”

Sicheng makes a face of disgust, and Jaehyun lets out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding. He chuckles quietly and approaches the two, with the ARC in tow. “As long as you ordered more than one. The other needs to be meaty and savoury to justify the pineapple.”

“Now that I like,” Sicheng chimes in.

Doyoung laughs, adding another pizza pie on the shopping list as he does. “Alright, fine. Right now we have one full medium Hawaiian pie, one full medium Meat Lover’s pie, a side of onion rings, and one order of chicken wings. How does that sound?”

Sicheng nods, and Jaehyun pulls the ARC a little closer, but the ARC refuses to move, and stays by the small kitchen counter, where Doyoung and Sicheng have left their bags, and their mini-ARCs behind. Giving up, Jaehyun joins Sicheng and Doyoung on the floor, and ARC-950701 stands a few paces away, sneaking glances at the three seated humans.

Then it notices two pairs of curious eyes peeking from the bags, as Kun and Jungwoo clamber out of their bags with unmatched eagerness. Kun waves a friendly hi at the silver-haired ARC. “Hey! I’m Kun, what’s your name?” He asks, holding out his hand.

Bright grey eyes look at the small hand for a moment, before unfolding its hand and makes contact.

“ARC-950701,” it answers, tone calm and even.

Kun eyes at him curiously as he lets go. Jungwoo, waiting his turn, also extends his hand. ARC-950701 moves its hand in his direction.

“I’m Jungwoo,” the mini-ARC introduces with a soft, shy smile.

ARC-950701 returns a small smile of its own.

“I don’t mean your serial number,” Kun clarifies. “Don’t you have a name?”

The ARC shakes its head.

“Oh,” Kun says quietly, and the three fall silent. Suddenly, his eyebrows shoot up. He bounces to the edge of the counter and points at Jaehyun. “I know! Ask him for one!”

Grey eyes glance across the room to where Jaehyun is- and sees him, Doyoung and Sicheng ducking their heads together, talking amongst each other. They crack a joke and laugh quietly, and Doyoung reaches to smack Jaehyun’s arm a few times. ARC-950701 narrows its eyes.

“Earth to ARC-950701! Are you there?” Kun shouts, waving his small hands and jumping up and down.

Large grey eyes turn back to the two mini-ARCS, startled.

Jungwoo follows its gaze and hums thoughtfully. “You must be interested in food! Do you like pizza?”

“I don’t know what a pizza is.”

“It’s like bread with toppings on top. You’ll see when it arrives.” Kun smiles. “You get to choose the toppings sometimes. I really like ham and pineapples and pepperoni and-”

“Kun, you’re overwhelming him!” Jungwoo chides without heat.

Kun glances up, and indeed, ARC-950701 has a kind of glazed look in his eyes. He chuckles sheepishly and scratches the back of his head. “Sorry, I get pretty excited when it comes to food.”

ARC-950701 manages a small nod. “Have you tried food before?”

Kun and Jungwoo look at each other before shaking their heads. “No, ARCs don’t eat,” replies Jungwoo.

“Oh.” It pauses, as though in thought. “Do you smell, then?”

“Yeah!” Kun replies.

ARC-950701 lowers its height to face the mini-ARCs at eye level. “I see. Is that how you perceive food?”

“We have a database of scents saved to our systems, and our preferences are matched to our controllers,” Kun answers. “So if I detect the same mixture of molecules, coupled with the visual, I can determine the food in front of me. It can be confusing when there are a lot of different scents in the air, but that’s how the human brain works. Our olfactory systems are designed to do the same sort of thing.”

For a moment ARC-950701 considers this information. It nods eventually. “I think I understand.”

“You’re very good at learning!” Jungwoo compliments.

Not knowing what to say, ARC-950701 nods again.

“Oh! I have something for you.” Kun suddenly remembers. He leaps off the counter, doing several flips before landing on the ground, then jogs across the floor. Jaehyun watches Kun’s acrobatic show with interest, smiling as he climbs up Sicheng’s leg like a squirrel.

“He looks like a squirrel,” Jaehyun jokes.

Sicheng takes no bullshit from anyone, especially not about his beloved mini-ARC, so he takes two strides and socks Jaehyun in the shoulder. ARC-950701 straightens again, watching them with an air of alertness.

“It took me weeks to make him move that gracefully. Kun is _ not _ squirrel-like, asshole,” Sicheng snaps, miffed.

Meanwhile, Kun taps his face to get his attention. “Can I start transferring systems over to ARC-950701? It may take a while.”

“As for Jaehyun’s permission,” Sicheng grumbles, turning to Jaehyun again. “I should charge you for them.”

Jaehyun chuckles nervously. “But you would never do that, because you’re the sweetest, most considerate friend, right?”

“Don’t push it,” Sicheng scrunches his nose.

Kun turns to Jaehyun with an expectant look in his eyes, and Jaehyun gives a curt nod. “What are the systems anyway?”

“Net and cloud connectivity are in one system, time and spatial sensory in another. I also have location tracking, memory documentation and recall, visual data, complex and abstract calculations, over a hundred languages in the language system, pressure and touchpoints, diagnostics, debug, and twenty three security systems.”

As the list grows, so too does Jaehyun’s eyes that by the end, he shoots Sicheng a look of incredulity and amazement, and is met with a half-hearted shrug.

“I write, tweak and personalize systems in my spare time.”

“I’m surprised you haven’t turned this into a source of passive income,” Jaehyun surmises, impressed.

Sicheng shrugs nonchalantly. “I usually write proprietary systems for those clients.”

“No wonder why you don’t need to work part time jobs.”

Doyoung picks up Jungwoo on the counter to rest him on his shoulder. “Back on topic. Jae, are you sure ARC-950701 is as clean a slate as they come? We can have Kun do a quick diagnostic check before implementing anything first.”

Jaehyun pauses, and half shrugs, half nods. “As far as I know, which isn’t saying much.” He turns to ARC-950701. “What do you say? Want to give this a shot?”

ARC-950701 looks between the three humans, then glances at Kun.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be thorough with my search,” Kun reassures with a grin.

After a pause, ARC-950701 nods. It approaches Kun, offering an arm for the mini-ARC to clamber on to reach its neck and shoulder. “Do we need to be connected?” It asks in a soft, low voice.

“Yeah, the two orange cable here,” Kun replies, pointing to the ports on its neck. “They go into your orange port.”

Jaehyun makes his way over. “I’ll help with that.”

ARC-950701 looks at him for a moment, before turning around and ducking its head, presenting Jaehyun with the six ports that go down its nape. The sight is unfamiliar, but Jaehyun ignores the thought and pulls Kun’s cord out.

“Plugging in now,” he announces. Kun flashes a thumbs up, and ARC-950701’s grey eyes watching him intensely for a moment before closing gently, firmly.

The cord clicks into place and Kun’s eyes grey out. After a pause, ARC-950701’s eyes do the same. Jaehyun moves back instinctively, and watches. It feels odd, to be facing human-like computers, waiting for them to run diagnostic tests and scans, and implement systems like a supercomputer would. He turns away to see Doyoung observing the scene unfold with undivided interest. Sicheng catches his gaze and smiles reassuringly.

“You should give him a name,” Doyoung notes in a quiet voice.

“I never knew it needed a name,” mutters Jaehyun.

“Start thinking now.” comes the short reply, then a shit-eating grin spreads across his face. “Think about what you would name your future baby.”

Jaehyun rolls his eyes in exasperation as Sicheng continues, “And stop thinking of him as an ‘it’, he’s much more sentient than that.”

Suddenly Kun makes a sound that is disjointed and _ not normal _. Something between a guttural groan and electronic parts not functioning. Then sparks escape the connection, and threads of electricity burst from the cords. The cord is ejected and flies back into Kun’s port, who jolts and is flung from his position on ARC-950701’s shoulder and on the floor.

“What the–”  
“Holy shit.”  
“Kun!”

Sicheng rushes to Kun first, while Jaehyun takes tentative steps to ARC-950701’s side. Kun, in Sicheng’s hand, whines and crackles.

“Who-ow,” Kun’s voice glitches and breaks. His eyes whir and auto-focus into function, before slowly regaining his surroundings. Sicheng lets out a sigh and slumps backwards, while Doyoung turns his attention to Jaehyun, who looks stricken as he gingerly turns the ARC upwards. Nothing is out of place, broken or burnt. Jaehyun feels something constrict in his stomach.

“Hey,” he says gently, shaking the shoulders of his ARC. “Can you hear me? Hey!”

The ARC remains unresponsive.

Feeling helpless, Jaehyun turns to Sicheng and Doyoung, who look equally helpless. Sicheng takes a shallow breath, and turns to Kun.

“Kun, are you okay? What happened?”

Kun blinks and blinks, no doubt making sense of the crash-report that is loaded somewhere within, and shakes his head once. He pats Sicheng’s hand in reassurance. “I’m okay. When you established the connection, I went through the regular implementation checklist to see if his hardware was compatible with the systems.” he pauses to look at the unresponsive ARC in Jaehyun’s arms, and frowns. “They were, and I didn’t detect any security systems going in. But I must’ve triggered something when I started the implementation. It felt like I was pushed out of his core.”

Doyoung and Sicheng meet Jaehyun’s bewildered eyes, then the three turn to look at the ARC in Jaehyun’s arms.

Kun presses on, “This is the first time I’ve been short-circuited. Diagnostics and debug systems are working to locate the error. A report should generate in a few minutes. I will send it to your band for easier viewing.”

Sicheng nods, cradling Kun a little closer to himself. Doyoung looks at ARC-950701 thoughtfully.

Jaehyun chews on his lip. “So that wasn’t normal.”

Sicheng shakes his head. “Most security systems don’t trigger an electric shock because it can also compromise their own cores. Viruses, on the other hand, are more common and reasonable. Kun has a defense software to combat any infections, but he’d know right away if anything tried to infiltrate his core.” He levels ARC-950701 with a calculative look. “Using electric shock is like the last line of defense. It’s uncontrollable and humans can get hurt, so it was never officially implemented because the risk is too great.”

“Well-” Doyoung interjects. “I know some countries design their ARC systems differently. I’ll look into that when I get home. But your model might be a foreign one, one that doesn’t abide to Korea’s production standards.”

Sicheng shakes his head. “That may be. But the chances of wandering upon a discarded foreign ARC is like…”

“Close to none,” Doyoung finishes, shooting Jaehuyn a look. “Korea has strict policies when it comes to ARCs crossing the borders. All ARC units are registered and approved by national security before being admitted, much like a human would with a passport. If there is even the slightest question, they’re immediately sent back or destroyed. No sane ARC owner would dispose a foreign ARC here, the consequences are… I don’t even know. I’ll need to look this up too.”

“So either someone’s fucked with this ARC’s security system, wiping everything, or they realized it was too old to be re-taught, and discarded it. Or it’s from a different country,” Jaehyun concludes.

Sicheng and Doyoung meet eyes, and Doyoung shrugs. “Yeah, basically. There are probably other factors we haven’t considered.”

They drift into a silence, each deep in thought.

“From what I know, he’s a clean slate.” Kun’s voice pipes in. “Physically, he’s not missing anything that would impede his daily functions. System-wise, I didn’t detect any on him before I began implementation.”

Doyoung shakes his head. “He learned through observation, so there has to be some kind of hard-coding that you couldn’t detect.”

Sicheng nods, watching Jungwoo pet Kun’s hair with gentle strokes. “Can’t rule out anything at this point.”

A silence falls on them as Jaehyun eases the ARC on his futon.

“He’ll wake up, right?” He asks quietly.

“Hard to say,” Doyoung replies. “But if Kun does, then he’ll probably come around too.”

Just then, the doorbell rings, jolting everyone back. Jaehyun jumps to his feet, and is met with a stuttering teenager who apologizes profusely for being late. Jaehyun waves it off with a tense smile, giving her the money, and sends her on her way.

“You should kick up a fuss and get these for free.” Doyoung snorts, making a beeline for the pizzas.

“It’s not easy to find my apartment.” Jaehyun rolls his eyes. It doesn’t matter if the world is coming to an end, nothing stands in the way of Doyoung and food. “I don’t know what to do,” he sighs. “I thought this would be easy.”

His friends meet eyes above, and Sicheng shakes his head. “It’s been less than twenty four hours since you got him. Don’t jump the gun on these decisions.”

Jaehyun sighs gloomily. “You really think it’s worth giving it another shot?”

“‘It’ is ‘he’, Jaehyun,” Doyoung corrects again, shooting him a pointed look. “Give us another week of tinkering before you discard him. You’ve already made the effort to bring him home, clean him, and give him a proper introduction. There’s no harm in trying.”

“It’s mostly us doing the work anyway,” Sicheng adds, picking at the pizza. Doyoung jumps to his side and reaches for a slice. Jaehyun scrunches his nose and looks around, measuring a space to fit the ARC unit in his small apartment.

“Plus, if worse comes to worst, all you need to do is to manually teach your ARC what he needs to do to help you which, if your uses are not complicated, is actually not that hard to do. An ARC is still better than no ARC,” Doyoung says. Sicheng makes a sound of agreement, his mouth too full to speak.

Jaehyun takes a deep inhale and nods. “You’re right.”

They finish the food in relative silence. Sicheng receives the diagnostics test, sending a copy to Doyoung, before the two go through the codes that make no sense to Jaehyun, deep frowns pulling at their eyebrows. Jaehyun continues to stare at ARC-950701, and then at Kun and Jungwoo, who are plugged into the wall to recharge.

Eventually, it is time to go, and they begin to pack up. Sicheng eyes at ARC-950701 warily, before carefully pocketing Kun and clapping Jaehyun’s shoulder goodnight. Doyoung plops Jungwoo on his shoulder before following behind Sicheng. Jaehyun eyes at their retrieving backs for a pause, then he tiredly slinks back into his apartment.

The guilt in his stomach doubles.

ARC-950701 lays unmoving in the middle of his living area, wearing his baggy clothes and looking like a human taking a nap. But it is neither a human, nor is it taking a nap.

Jaehyun sighs, rubbing the back of his neck to release some tension. Doyoung and Sicheng are right, he has space for the ARC unit, and there’s no harm in waiting out this black-out. He’s survived thus long without an ARC anyway, one more week wouldn’t make a difference. Shaking his head, he washes up quickly and catches on some reading materials before he sleeps. But he can’t focus. Doyoung’s words echo in his memory again- a name. He, not it. His sentience-

“Lights to 0%.” He says, tucking away his book as the room gradually darkens.

He rolls to his side and regards the ARC’s side profile.

“Please don’t kill me in my sleep,” he mutters quietly, closing his eyes.

•••

The room is pitch black.

Silver eyes snap open as ARC-950701 jolts awake, taking quick, deep gulps of air, heart pounding in its chest. It immediately looks to his side, where Jaehyun lays asleep, and remembers. The implementation backfired. It squeezes its eyes, trying to replay the soft conversation after he blacked out. The information comes to it naturally, like a stream of consciousness.

Kun is okay.

Sicheng and Doyoung left shortly after.

Slowly, ARC-950701’s heartbeat steadies to normal. It steals another look at Jaehyun, then notes that it is under the bed covers too. _ This is sleep, _ it notes. As it shifts around, the narrow pillow rustles under its head. The noise draws a frown on Jaehyun’s face and he rolls to his side, so it and Jaehyun are now face to face.

Then warm brown eyes open, and Jaehyun looks directly at it. It stops moving.

They stare at each other for a very long time. It sees Jaehyun’s pulse along the side of his neck, above the left of his chest. Its eyes shift slightly, breaking the spell. Jaehyun blinks awake.

“Are you okay?”

Jaehyun reaches between them to place a hand on its shoulder. The sensation from Jaehyun’s palm reminds it of the lesson about temperature this morning. Warmth. Jaehyun is warm, alive and breathing.

“I’m okay,” ARC-950701 replies.

Jaehyun lets out a long breath and shuffles closer. “Thank god,” He mumbles and, unthinkingly, reaches for its hand in the middle and envelops it. “Sorry for forcing you to undergo. I didn’t know- I didn’t know anything.” He pauses, eyes narrowing to slits as a thumb rubs circles at the back of his hand. "I didn’t mean to trigger your defense mechanism. I didn’t mean to hurt or break you”

“It’s okay, I’m not broken.” ARC-950701 repeats after a pause.

Jaehyun shakes his head. “It won’t happen again. I promise,” he pauses, inhaling quietly. “I'll take it slow. I’ll teach you basic things, maybe bring you to the library because I don’t have all the answers. You should be open with me too, so we can learn from each other, okay?”

ARC-950701 doesn’t know what to say, so it nods.

Jaehyun lets go of ARC-950701’s hand, so it thinks the conversation is over, but suddenly, an arm drapes around its middle and pulls it close- close enough that its head is tucked under Jaehyun’s chin, its ear above Jaehyun’s heart–

“I’m sorry.”

It doesn’t sleep. At least, it doesn’t need sleep the same way Jaehyun does. But something tugs inside its chest, so it pulls back slightly and captures Jaehyun’s hand in its own, like Jaehyun had done, and presses its ear closer against Jaehyun’s heart beat.

“Good night.”

The corners of Jaehyun's eyes crinkle and a small, crooked smile forms on his lips.

“Good night.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for ending on a heavier note. It's not easy learning to live with an ARC, but I hope you enjoyed the chapter :) A BIG THANK YOU to all those who left comments, kudos'd, bookmarked, read and shared the story! ^ u ^ <3 Next chapter, we'll be gearing up for a shopping trip! (Because ARC-950701 can't keep wearing Jaehyun's clothes... or can he? *wink*)'
> 
> Take care, and tread softly <3

**Author's Note:**

> If you have any questions, find me at these places. Promise I won't bite ;)
> 
> [tw](https://twitter.com/pnkpxls) | [cc](https://curiouscat.me/pnkpxls)


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